Alumni Spotlight: SustainU Partners with Major League Baseball

SustainU, a leading producer of apparel using fabrics from 100 percent recycled materials that are manufactured in the USA, today announced its licensed partnership with Major League Baseball (MLB) for the 2016 season.

“We are so proud to launch our new line of products with Major League Baseball,” said Chris Yura '03, founder and CEO of SustainU. “We represent American Craftsmanship, innovation and localized production. This pairs perfectly with America’s Pastime and we’re excited to showcase our collection online and in stadiums around the country.”

Yura played fullback for the Notre Dame Irish, and afterwards did a brief stint as a model. During that time, he started to think about the potential for clothing to make a positive impact on society. "I began to do some research into how clothing was made and what happened to the factories in the Carolinas after NAFTA," he said. "In 1997, 40 percent of the clothing we wore was made in the United States. Now it is around 2 percent.”

Yura went on to learn how more sustainable fabrics could be used, how to produce clothing with fewer chemicals, and how to grow fibers with fewer pesticides. He soon saw the potential to bring environmentally friendly jobs back to his home state of West Virginia, where he had witnessed extensive poverty and unemployment.

Yura was also featured in the New York Times for hiring a factory that employs blind or visually impaired workers, a population that typically suffers from extremely high unemployment.

Since 2009, SustainU has experienced exponential growth, and now in another big leap forward, the “MLB by SustainU” line is now available in stadiums and online at MLB.com/shop and SustainUclothing.com.

Teams from both the National League and American League are represented in the clothing line. The specific collections embody millennial, fashion and outdoor adventure-inspired graphics to resonate with a new generation of fans that advocate sustainability, outdoor conservation and related social values.